I'll Give You A Lift
by doodleswriter357
Summary: Five times Artie gave someone a lift in his wheelchair when they were feeling down, and one time someone carried him.


**AN: Based on a prompt at glee_fluff: Five times Artie gave someone a lift in his wheelchair when they were feeling down, and one time someone carried him. **

* * *

Artie was finishing up switching his books at his locker between classes when he heard it; the cruel laughter and taunts of some of the Cheerios. He glanced around and saw a group of the tell-tale red and white uniforms. They were surrounding someone else at their locker and were tossing out insult at the person standing there. Just then, the person broke through the crowd and started walking away, head held high despite the tears sparkling in her eyes.

A couple of the Cheerios let out a last taunt as they walked away from Quinn who was determinedly ignoring them. A passing jock rudely shoulder- bumped her, laughing when she fell to the ground, her books scattering across the floor. After taking a moment to collect herself, she gathered them up again, and started to stand up. Artie started moving towards her, and as he got closer, he could see the tears welling up, and just how exhausted she looked close up.

"Need a lift to class?" he asked. She looked down at him in surprise. They had never really spoken before; their only connection being Glee club.

"Thanks but no thanks," she said. "I'd probably break the chair." She gestured at her ever-expanding stomach. Artie just chuckled lightly at that.

"You'd be surprised at how durable these things are. Mine's withheld much heavier weight before." Quinn considered him carefully before nodding slightly and sliding gently down onto his lap. The ride to her class was relatively silent, with only the squeaking of the wheels being heard. They got some stares on the way over there, but both had separately experienced worse than people looking at them funny, so they ignored all of them.

"Thank you," Quinn said quietly once Artie had arrived at her science class.

"No problem," Artie replied, smiling brightly at her before turning and wheeling towards his own class. Quinn stared after him, still slightly surprised from the encounter. Although she had been terrible to them, all the Glee kids had been going out of their ways to help her out. Maybe she had misjudged them before.

* * *

Tina sighed as she slammed her locker shut, and then slumped against it with her eyes closed. Her day had been going terribly so far, and it wasn't looking up. Her parents had spent all breakfast telling her that she needed to get her grades up – or else. Then one of the jocks had slushied her after first period, ruining her favorite shirt. She also had a math test in seventh period that she was convinced she was going to fail.

Just then, she felt something nudge her leg. She opened her eyes and glanced down. Artie was sitting by her side, smiling up at her.

"Hi," he greeted her.

"Hi," she replied monotonously.

"What's wrong?" he asked, peering up at her in concern.

"…everything," she finally replied. He frowned, before grasping her hand and pulling her down towards him. She slid herself onto his lap, wrapping her arms around his neck and burying her face into his shoulder. He gave her a long hug before pulling his arms away to place them on the wheels and start pushing them down the hall. As they moved, Tina managed to tell him all the bad things that had happened to her that day.

She felt foolish unloading her troubles on him, feeling that in retrospect they weren't as bad as she had previously thought. However, Artie responded to each one, giving her comforting support or wincing at the mention of the slushy.

Eventually they made it to her classroom, and she pulled back from his shoulder where she had been resting her head. After Artie promised again that he would help her study for her math test at lunch, she smiled and gave him a kiss before climbing off his lap. He blushed slightly from the public display of affection, but smiled after her as she walked into the class and took her seat next to Mercedes. The other girl spent the rest of the hour teasing Tina about how she and Artie were so co-dependent.

* * *

If someone had told Artie that he would join the football team at some point during his high school career (or anytime in his life for that matter) he would have laughed in their face. However, due to other various events that he could have also never predicted, he ended up joining the McKinley High Titans. He knew the only reason that Coach Beiste had allowed him on the team was because the other teams would be reluctant to tackle him and that was how they were winning, but it was better than nothing.

The team was so terrible that he figured that was the only reason that the other boys tolerated his presence as well. Before he joined the team, the only game they had won in years was the one when Kurt had joined and had them dance to Beyonce. Artie didn't know the first thing about sports and even he could tell that they sucked.

When Finn managed to twist his ankle by tripping over the strap of someone's gym bag while trying to get to his water bottle, Artie had to seriously wonder if something inside the boy wasn't formed right when he was born and was the reason for his serious lack of balance. Luckily Coach Beiste had declared that his ankle would be fine if he kept off of it for the rest of the day and kept an ice pack on it. Artie was designated as being the one to help Finn down the nurses' station, by letting Finn use the handles of his chair as a support system.

When it took them ten minutes to just get out of the locker room and down half the hallway, Artie realized that it would be the next day by the time they actually got to the nurses' room. He stopped in the middle of the hallway, causing Finn to ask what was wrong.

"This is just ridiculous," Artie told him, turning around to face him. Finn wobbled on one foot with nothing to hold onto.

"Well how else are we going to get down there?" Finn asked, wind milling rather ridiculously to try and keep his balance. Artie had to refrain himself from rolling his eyes at the quarterback, before reaching out to grab his arm and pulled the taller boy down onto his lap.

"Whoa, what?" Finn squawked, completely unprepared for the shift in balance and found himself perched on Artie's lap. With some difficulty, Artie managed to turn his chair around and started pushing down the hall.

"Dude, what are you doing?" Finn asked, squirming around, simultaneously trying to find a comfortable position, stop the chair from moving, and get off of Artie's lap.

"Stop moving, you're making this even more difficult," Artie replied.

"But…this is…" Finn protested.

"The only way we're going to get to the nurses room this year," Artie finished for him. "Seriously Finn, there's no one else around. I don't see what the big deal is."

As Finn glanced around, he saw that the halls were indeed, empty of students. It didn't stop him from feeling slightly uncomfortable for the rest of the ride to the nurses' room. Once there, the nurse made him stay with an ice pack on his ankle while Artie got to go back to the locker room.

"Thanks," Finn called out belatedly as Artie was halfway out the door.

"Yup," the other boy called back.

* * *

Artie looked up from his locker to see Brittany standing in front of him, much like earlier in the week when she had approached him about being duet partners. He smiled cautiously at her, not completely sure what she wanted. She had a strange look on her face, and he didn't know her well enough to be able to read her facial expressions.

"Hey Brittany, what's up?" he ventured. She simply cocked her head and studied him carefully. Artie was starting to feel slightly concerned. He turned his chair towards her, ready to try and figure out what was going on with her when she simply plopped down onto his lap.

"Um," he said intelligently.

"Can you give me a ride?" she asked. "I really liked the chairs when we had them last year but I lost mine so now I can't use it. I was getting really good at the spins too." She looked so disappointed that Artie couldn't help but smile and nod at her.

"Of course I can give you a ride. Where's your next class?" She merely pointed down the hall and he started off in that direction. Unlike everyone else that he had ever given a ride to, Brittany seemed to enjoy it the most. She was bouncing up and down on his lap and waving at people as they passed by. Artie had to bite back his laughter at the expressions on some of the people's faces.

"Wait it's right there!" Brittany called out as they rolled past one of the English classrooms. Artie carefully backed up, and Brittany hopped off his lap.

"That was fun!" she exclaimed, jumping up and down, clapping her hands. She leaned down and gave him a quick kiss on the cheek before waving as she ran into the classroom. Artie had to shake his head at her. He wasn't quite sure what entering a relationship with Brittany would entail, but he had the feeling he was starting to get an idea of it.

* * *

The depressed and upset look on Kurt's face contrasted greatly with the sunny yellow jacket and boots he was wearing. He was also sitting on the floor, leaning up against his locker. If Artie knew one thing after being friends with Kurt as long as he had, it was that he wouldn't be putting himself in a position where his clothes could get dirty. And the floor of the hallway was particularly gross.

And that was a rather bright yellow jacket.

However, Kurt didn't seem to even notice that he was sitting on the dirty floor, let alone the loud throngs of people moving about him. Artie knew there had to be a serious problem if Kurt was in the position he was. Maneuvering his way around a particularly enthusiastic group of Cheerios, he made his way over to the boy sitting on the floor. Kurt didn't even glance up when the wheelchair was directly in front of him.

"Hey," Artie said, determined to get Kurt's attention. Kurt glanced up and Artie couldn't help but be surprised at the expression on his face. The proud, uncaring, slightly bitchy look that Kurt had perfected and usually wore during school hours was nowhere to be found. Instead, he looked emotionally exhausted and worn out.

"Hi," Kurt answered emotionlessly.

"What's wrong?" Artie pressed.

"Nothing," was Kurt's quiet reply. He started to get to his feet, wincing at the fresh bruises that were no doubt developing from the latest round of locker bashing. Artie reached out a hand to help steady him, and Kurt automatically flinched at the contact. He couldn't help but glance at Artie who was looking rather concerned at his behavior.

"I'm fine," Kurt insisted reaching to close his locker door. He couldn't help wincing again as he stretched his bruised limbs.

"Then why do you keep making faces that make you look like you're in pain?" Artie demanded.

"I'm…just sore from being pushed into lockers," Kurt muttered. Artie pursed his lips at that. He knew that Karofsky had been bugging Kurt more than usual, but he never seemed to actually see it happening. Having dealt with his own fair share of bullying, he knew first-hand how painful the bullying could get. With a somewhat practiced ease, he reached out, grabbed Kurt's wrist and pulled the other boy onto his lap.

Kurt let out an indignant squeak at the suddenness of the action. Before he could get his bearings about him, Artie started moving forward in the direction of the choir room.

"What are you doing – Artie, let me go!" Kurt cried.

"Nope," Artie replied. "We're going to Glee; stop squirming. You're as bad as Finn."

"No I'm not," Kurt muttered, but that seemed to pacify him. He spent the rest of the ride with his arms crossed, refusing to look at Artie who was openly laughing at him. They got more than a couple stares as they headed down the hall, but nobody actually said anything to them.

As they got to the door of the choir room, they could hear a burst of laughter from inside. Mercedes could apparently see them coming, and found it hilarious. As they got closer, Artie heard Brittany claiming that it was really fun, and Finn saying that he was really stubborn. Kurt held his head high as they made their way into the room. Mr. Schuester was coming out of his office as they entered and gave them a strange look. By this time, the other two had joined in the laughter with Mercedes, mainly at the look on Kurt's face.

"Can I get up now?" Kurt asked stiffly.

"Sure, I guess so," Artie replied cheerfully. Kurt carefully raised himself off the other boy's lap and after straightening his clothes out, stalked over to sit next to Mercedes. A small smile threatened to break out across his face, but Kurt managed to suppress it.

* * *

Mr. Schuester had just called the meeting to order and was trying to direct the topic towards Sectionals, when Mercedes interrupted him.

"Um, Mr. Schue, Artie isn't here yet." After a quick glance around, he realized that she was right.

"Wasn't he in school today?" Will inquired his students.

"Yeah, we just saw him in practice," Finn replied, looking confused. "He was still in the locker room right before we left to come here."

"I'll go look for him," Puck volunteered, already standing up. When Mr. Schuester nodded his consent, he headed off for the locker room. When he got there, it was empty of players. He cocked his head and listened carefully; the only noise was the sound of water dripping from the showers – wait there was something else. It sounded like someone humming. He carefully crept into the room, looking into each aisle as he passed. In the last one, he found the source of the humming and the boy he had come looking for in the first place. Artie was sitting up against the lockers, absentmindedly humming to himself as he tossed a football from hand to hand.

"Dude, what are you still doing here?" Puck demanded of him, making the other boy jump.

"Oh," he said after he recovered from the slight shock of Puck appearing out of thin air. "Karofsky and Azimio stole my chair after I told Karofsky that I'd get Brittany and Santana to spread a rumor that he has STD's."

"Seriously?" Puck asked, surprised at his daring. "Dude, that's totally bad-ass."

"Yeah, 'cept now I'm stuck here. Unless you can find my chair which is probably in a dumpster somewhere or hanging from the flagpole. Or at the bottom of the pool," he added as an afterthought.

"That's bogus," Puck snapped, mentally cursing the jocks. "Well, we need you for rehearsal right now."

"I don't know how that's going to happen," Artie said honestly. "I have no idea how I'm going to get there." Puck pondered the situation for a moment before moving in front of Artie, crouching down, and saying,

"Arms around my neck." Artie obliged, confused at what Puck was doing. Once the other boy's arms were tightly wrapped around him, Puck reached out, grabbed his legs, and hoisted him onto his back.

"C'mon Abrams, it's time for rehearsal." Artie grinned widely from his perch on Puck's back. It was a very strange experience, making his way down the hall, and seeing everything from up so high. He could see the tops of lockers now, and he wasn't at eye level with people's butts. The choir room wasn't too far from the locker room, and they made it there in a couple of minutes. Everyone stared as Puck entered the room with Artie on his back.

"I found him, Mr. Schue," Puck called out. Everyone had to laugh, especially at the delighted look on Artie's face. Puck lowered him into a chair while a couple of them went out to search for his chair. Rachel found it in the bushes out in front of the school and after that, they were finally able to get on with rehearsal.

_

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Hope you enjoyed it! Feedback is much appreciated as usual._


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